St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

Police say they weren’t shocked to learn that a recent apartment blaze that killed two people in Jefferson County was sparked by a failed attempt to make methamphetamine. In fact, drug investigators say they’re surprised more meth cooks haven’t died in fires.

[…] It’s precision work carried out with imprecise equipment and by people with little knowledge of basic chemistry. On top of that, the so-called cooks often are high on the powerfully addictive drug that can keep its users in a distorted euphoria for days on end.

So this is unbelievably, incredibly dangerous work being done by people who are in a distorted euphoria for days on end, say the police.

But they are surprised that more of these people don’t blow themselves up. Could it just possibly be that the cops are either overestimating the danger, or underestimating the knowledge and skill of the meth producers?

Do you think? Naah. The police would never, ever exaggerate things just to whip up hysteria.

“This isn’t three guys in lab coats working in a controlled environment making pharmaceuticals,” said Cpl. Jason Grellner, commander of the Franklin County drug task force. “It’s more like three guys in overalls making moonshine … and not really having any idea what they’re doing.

And why is this? Could it possibly be because investing in proper equipment is pointless when the police can step in and seize all of it? Could it possibly be because, while meth production appears to be pretty lucrative, people with the best training will choose to do something else, rather than run the risk of an encounter with the cops?

The froth over the supposed dangers of meth labs — in 2004, 27 people (including three children) died in meth lab accidents, according to the DEA, which means that running a meth lab actually looks quite safe — rings a big hollow since most or all of these dangers would disappear overnight if it weren’t for the War On Some Drugs. Making whiskey also involves volatile evaporates, but I can’t remember the last time I heard about someone being killed in a distillery explosion, or about someone setting up a clandestine ‘whiskey lab’ in a motel.

So which is it? The culture at large seems to have decided that the cost of people getting high is so great that it merits laws that encourage clandestine, dangerous production of meth (which is apparently a fairly nasty drug and which is only in demand anyway because of other market-distorting actions of the DEA et al.)

So stop complaining about the unintended but entirely forseeable effects of your own bad policies.